On Dec. 10, political newcomer Davante Lewis was elected to represent District 3 on the Louisiana Public Service Commission, the body that regulates public utilities for most of the state. Lewis defeated longtime incumbent and fellow Democrat Lambert Boissiere III — a member of a prominent New Orleans political family who had heavy institutional support — and became the first openly LGBTQ person elected to a state-level seat in Louisiana.

Charles Maldonado
Charles comes to Verite from The Lens, an award-winning nonprofit investigative news website founded in New Orleans in 2009. Charles worked at The Lens for more than nine years, serving as a reporter and editor. He previously worked as a reporter at Gambit, the New Orleans alternative newsweekly, and newspapers in Tennessee, New York and his hometown of Detroit, Michigan.